"Oh!" he would cry out, "I would die for her; I would gang to the world's end to pleasure her! I whiles think that I break the first commandment every day of my life, for I canna keep her a moment out of my thoughts, and I fear she's more to me than any earthly thing should be. I think of her at nicht. I see her name in every page of the Book. I thought I was bad when I was over at Clachlands, and had to ride five miles to see her; but now I'm tenfold worse when I'm biding aside her. God grant it be not counted to me for sin!" "Amen to that," said I. 'Tis a fine thing to see the love of a maid; but I hold 'tis a finer to witness the passion of a strong man. Yet, withal, there was something sinister about the house and its folk which to me was the fly in the ointment. They were kindness and charity incarnate, but they were cold and gloomy to boot, lacking any grace or sprightliness in their lives. I find it hard to write this, for their goodness to me was beyond recompense; yet I must set it down, since in some measure it has to do with my story. The old man would look at me at times and sigh, nor did I think it otherwise than fitting, till I found from his words that the sighs were on account of my own spiritual darkness. I have no quarrel with any man for wishing to convert me, but to sigh at one's approach seems a doleful way of setting about it. Then he would break out from his wonted quietness at times to rail at his foes, calling down the wrath of Heaven to blight them. Such a fit was always followed by a painful exhaustion, which left him as weak as a child, and shivering like a leaf. I bitterly cursed the state of a country which could ruin the peace of mind of a man so sweet-tempered by nature, and make him the sport of needless rage. 'Twas pitiful to see him creep off to his devotions after any such outbreak, penitent and ashamed. Even to his daughter he was often cruelly sharp, and would call her to account for the merest trifle. As for Master Henry, what shall I say of him? I grew to love him like my own brother, yet I no more understood him than the Sultan of Turkey. He had strange fits of gloom, begotten, I must suppose, of the harsh country and his many anxieties, in which he was more surly than a bear, speaking little, and that mainly from the Scriptures. I have one case in my memory, when, had I not been in a sense his guest, I had scarce refrained from quarreling. 'Twas in the afternoon of the second day, when we returned weary from one of our long wanderings. Anne tripped forth into the autumn sunlight singing a catch, a simple glee of the village folk. "Peace, Anne," says Master Henry savagely; "it little becomes you to be singing in these days, unless it be a godly psalm. Keep your songs for better times." "What ails you?" I ventured to say. "You praised her this very morning for singing the self-same verses."